'Blonde Charity Mafia': The Girls Are Back in Town

If everything had gone according to plan for "Blonde Charity Mafia," then its D.C.-based stars might be sharing their diet tips on the cover of Us Weekly by now, or rivaling Lauren Conrad and Heidi Montag as paparazzi bait. (Okay, maybe in our dreams.)

But the reality show -- a Beltway version of "The Hills," chronicling the lives and loves of Washington junior socialites -- has suffered some delays on its way to the airwaves.

"Blonde Charity Mafia" once was scheduled to have a place of quasi-honor on the basic-cable lineup last fall -- as a six-episode tryout following new episodes of "Project Runway" on Lifetime. But that was before the lady-centric network got embroiled in litigation with NBC Universal over its rights to air the Heidi Klum hit, forcing it to reshuffle. Lifetime rescheduled BCM for sometime-in-'09 -- before dropping it.

It's since been picked up by CW -- sort of. Under the new relationship, the series is categorized as back "in development," reports our colleague Lisa de Moraes, which in TV talk means "no promises."

So five months after filming wrapped, crews are back in town this week trailing its young stars -- Katherine Kennedy, Krista Johnson and Sophie Pyle -- for fresh footage. Some will be shot at a party tomorrow, the invitation for which proclaims "Welcome to Washington," over an image of the Capitol.

Welcome whom, exactly? Is the show shifting focus from Georgetown scenesters and charity galas to, say, young politicos and Capitol Hill? (Just a guess: We read somewhere that politics is "hot" these days and Washington is "cool" again.)

A rep for the production team e-mailed us that the new filming is "to stay current with the lives of our cast members" and that "the show has always been political -- we are in D.C. after all!" (She wouldn't say if they're still calling it "Blonde Charity Mafia.") Kennedy, in an e-mail, told us they're "really excited" to "have the opportunity to capture the energy of the new administration."